[Rather than reply to the comments replying to the previous rant, thought it better to do a new post.]
The fan/academic relationship is one that I find particularly interesting and problematic. It often seems to me that for the fan empirical data counts more, for the academic theory. I feel that both have their place and can be equally valuable, but it's the accompanying territorial pissings and frequent lack of connection.
In retrospect, the Inglorious Basterds essays were probably especially likely to get me going, simply because a book on that film is such an obvious and lazy thing to do. Or it's an exploitative book, on a mock exploitation movie that I was suckered into getting and which then made me feel exploited?
A study of Eurowar films with chapters on, say, Castellari and Lenzi's contributions just wouldn't have the brand recognition.
It's like those collections on [insert name of contemporary TV series/film] and Philosophy where you sense what basically amounts to a circle jerk between the parties involved. There's no organic relationship, just a text that's ready made for commentary.
An obvious example would be Dr Who: Who gave a fuck about that programme during its 1980s death-throes? But now that it's been rebooted and given the official seal of approval by the cultural taste-makers? Or, there's a big difference between bringing out queer subtexts planted by Russell T. Davies compared to looking at John Nathan Turner era Who and trying to discern if his homosexuality might likewise be found in the programme.
Monday, 25 February 2013
Sunday, 24 February 2013
A Rant
I recently got a book about Inglorious Basterds. It has an essay by Chris Fujiwara, about excess in the film. He says that the opening title, Once Upon a Time, in Nazi Occupied Europe (or whatever it exactly is) is excessive.
Yet, in all his discussions of excess here and elsewhere in the film, he never refers to Classical Hollywood Cinema as an excessively obvious cinema, as with its norm of doing something three times or conveying the same narrative point through multiple devices.
Nor does Fujiwara refer to Roland Barthes' notion of excess, in terms of a third meaning.
Nor does he mention how this specific once upon a time (myth) / in Nazi occupied Europe (concrete) relates to the models supplied by Sergio Leone with Once Upon a Time / in the West and Once Upon a Time / in America.
Nor does Fujiwara refer to how this intertitle might have translated in Italian, as Once Upon A Time: Nazi Europe.
Yes, Tarantino's direction is certainly excessive by the standards of classical Hollywood, but classical Hollywood is also excessive by the standards of the transcendental style of Ozu or Bresson, just as it is restrained by the standards of Bollywood.
All in all, I feel Fujiwara fundamentally fails to define his terms adequately and to situate them historically, given that contemporary Hollywood is largely excessive in relation to classical Hollywood.
A question, then: are the multiple angles on the explosion in Zabriskie Point excessive/redundant, in that they give us no new information, as only different but commensurable perspectives, and that there is no camera positioned, say, inside the building, or below it, or above it, or at a microscopic or macroscopic level.
This is not the first time I have read something by Fujiwara and felt his discussion was inadequate. There is another essay by him on boredom and the Umberto Lenzi film Spasmo in a collection on cult cinema, where he invokes some continental philosophy, but I suspect he has seen very little of Lenzi's work as a whole, so I feel his discussion is basically pointless intellectual wankery that is about imposing theory upon a convenient text. I may only have only seen 50% or so of Lenzi's films -- i.e. ~30 out of ~60 -- but the one thing I would say them, on balance, is that they are rarely boring. Rather they are very much driven by action. I would respect Fujiwara's discussion much more if he had, say, previously written an essay on images of masculinity presented by Tomas Milian and Maurizio Merli in Lenzi's crime films.
How does one get into a position of being able to get away with this sort of thing? Or at least being able to make money/a career from it? Are there only certain areas of cinema that are worth bothering about? Is it best to read up on theory (not necessarily film theory) and take some choice quotes from Bataille/Levinas/Heidegger or who/what-ever and then go to the films?
Or, a quote: "I ain't no white trash piece of shit. [...] I can out-learn you. I can out-read you. I can out-think you. And I can out-philosophize you. And I'm gonna outlast you. You think a couple whacks to my guts is gonna get me down? It's gonna take a hell of a lot more than that [...] to prove you're better than me!”
Yet, in all his discussions of excess here and elsewhere in the film, he never refers to Classical Hollywood Cinema as an excessively obvious cinema, as with its norm of doing something three times or conveying the same narrative point through multiple devices.
Nor does Fujiwara refer to Roland Barthes' notion of excess, in terms of a third meaning.
Nor does he mention how this specific once upon a time (myth) / in Nazi occupied Europe (concrete) relates to the models supplied by Sergio Leone with Once Upon a Time / in the West and Once Upon a Time / in America.
Nor does Fujiwara refer to how this intertitle might have translated in Italian, as Once Upon A Time: Nazi Europe.
Yes, Tarantino's direction is certainly excessive by the standards of classical Hollywood, but classical Hollywood is also excessive by the standards of the transcendental style of Ozu or Bresson, just as it is restrained by the standards of Bollywood.
All in all, I feel Fujiwara fundamentally fails to define his terms adequately and to situate them historically, given that contemporary Hollywood is largely excessive in relation to classical Hollywood.
A question, then: are the multiple angles on the explosion in Zabriskie Point excessive/redundant, in that they give us no new information, as only different but commensurable perspectives, and that there is no camera positioned, say, inside the building, or below it, or above it, or at a microscopic or macroscopic level.
This is not the first time I have read something by Fujiwara and felt his discussion was inadequate. There is another essay by him on boredom and the Umberto Lenzi film Spasmo in a collection on cult cinema, where he invokes some continental philosophy, but I suspect he has seen very little of Lenzi's work as a whole, so I feel his discussion is basically pointless intellectual wankery that is about imposing theory upon a convenient text. I may only have only seen 50% or so of Lenzi's films -- i.e. ~30 out of ~60 -- but the one thing I would say them, on balance, is that they are rarely boring. Rather they are very much driven by action. I would respect Fujiwara's discussion much more if he had, say, previously written an essay on images of masculinity presented by Tomas Milian and Maurizio Merli in Lenzi's crime films.
How does one get into a position of being able to get away with this sort of thing? Or at least being able to make money/a career from it? Are there only certain areas of cinema that are worth bothering about? Is it best to read up on theory (not necessarily film theory) and take some choice quotes from Bataille/Levinas/Heidegger or who/what-ever and then go to the films?
Or, a quote: "I ain't no white trash piece of shit. [...] I can out-learn you. I can out-read you. I can out-think you. And I can out-philosophize you. And I'm gonna outlast you. You think a couple whacks to my guts is gonna get me down? It's gonna take a hell of a lot more than that [...] to prove you're better than me!”
Monday, 18 February 2013
Erotic Inferno
When their father dies in a yachting accident Paul and Martin Barnard are summoned to the family’s mansion for a reading of the will. Also summoned is Adam, their father’s loyal chauffeur and procurer of women. Adam does not know that he is the dead man’s illegitimate son and, being two years older than Martin, the one whom primogeniture should favour. Martin and Paul thus determine to inveigle their way into their father’s mansion, locked up until the reading of the will is to take place, and destroy all evidence of their half-brother’s claims. In the meantime, Adam, Martin and Paul are each ensconced in the servant’s building, along with various women...
Whilst entitled Erotic Inferno this 1976 British sexploitation entry remains firmly (ooh, er!) on the legal side of softcore. This said, the plentiful sex scenes are effective in their suggestive way, in that you don’t see what’s going on, that being left to the imagination, but not much imagination is required.
Moreover, even if the version under review, sourced from a pre-cert VHS, purports to be uncut, the casting of Heather Deeley and Mary Maxted (i.e. Millington) suggests that the filmmakers could have prepared a harder version for foreign and/or clandestine domestic distribution.
Produced by Indian-British sexploitation mainstay Bachoo Sen, the film has various other intertextual connections: Writer Jonathan Gershfield, credited as Jon York, had earlier appeared on the James Kenelm Clarke directed Man Alive documentary Xploitation, about the British sex film. Xploitation had also featured Sen and Erotic Inferno’s director Trevor Wrenn, who had earlier collaborated with Jose Larraz.
Together, Clarke, with Expose, and Larraz, with Vampyres and Black Candles, emerge as the filmmakers closest to Wrenn, for the isolated setting; the propensity to use sex scenes as a means of advancing the narrative; and the prominence given sapphic activity.
There are some ambitious and indeed effective shots, as when Wrenn racks focus to capture Adam in the wing mirror of a Rolls Royce.
While all three of the male protagonists are equally unpleasant both in general and in their Neanderthal attitudes towards women a broad ranking of most to least obnoxious does emerge; if none undergoes a Damascean conversion there are thus perhaps enough hints to make their respective positions comprehensible.
KPM supply the music, very much your typical selection of library themes.
Overall, worth a look for the completist.
Whilst entitled Erotic Inferno this 1976 British sexploitation entry remains firmly (ooh, er!) on the legal side of softcore. This said, the plentiful sex scenes are effective in their suggestive way, in that you don’t see what’s going on, that being left to the imagination, but not much imagination is required.
Moreover, even if the version under review, sourced from a pre-cert VHS, purports to be uncut, the casting of Heather Deeley and Mary Maxted (i.e. Millington) suggests that the filmmakers could have prepared a harder version for foreign and/or clandestine domestic distribution.
Produced by Indian-British sexploitation mainstay Bachoo Sen, the film has various other intertextual connections: Writer Jonathan Gershfield, credited as Jon York, had earlier appeared on the James Kenelm Clarke directed Man Alive documentary Xploitation, about the British sex film. Xploitation had also featured Sen and Erotic Inferno’s director Trevor Wrenn, who had earlier collaborated with Jose Larraz.
Together, Clarke, with Expose, and Larraz, with Vampyres and Black Candles, emerge as the filmmakers closest to Wrenn, for the isolated setting; the propensity to use sex scenes as a means of advancing the narrative; and the prominence given sapphic activity.
There are some ambitious and indeed effective shots, as when Wrenn racks focus to capture Adam in the wing mirror of a Rolls Royce.
While all three of the male protagonists are equally unpleasant both in general and in their Neanderthal attitudes towards women a broad ranking of most to least obnoxious does emerge; if none undergoes a Damascean conversion there are thus perhaps enough hints to make their respective positions comprehensible.
KPM supply the music, very much your typical selection of library themes.
Overall, worth a look for the completist.
Friday, 15 February 2013
Latest acquisition
Delirium locandina:
Should hopefully be back to posting more regularly soon; too often crushed by depression.
Should hopefully be back to posting more regularly soon; too often crushed by depression.
Friday, 25 January 2013
La llamada del vampiro / The Curse of the Vampire
Following the death of Dr Mersch, Dr Dora Maeterlick and her assistant travel to a remote village. Maeterlick has an additional motive for taking up this new post. She, like Mersch, is interested in the subject of vampirism. The local nobility are sceptical about the existence of supernatural creatures, but the lower orders know better; so do we, having seen how Mersch died in the pre-credits sequence; this also makes us aware the nobility may have other reasons for their purported scepticism...
While the setting is not identified the names of the characters – others include Carl (not Carlos), Greta, Max and Otto – suggest a Germanic rather than Spanish setting. So does another character, Margaret, reportedly fleeing to Switzerland.
Situating horror films outside Spain was, of course, a common feature of late Franco-era productions. It enabled filmmakers to get away with more by providing the excuse that these images were not meant to represent Spain.
The distinctively Spanish nature of the film is, however, conveyed by aspects of the vampire myth as presented here.
Besides the usual tropes around crosses, stakes, and not reflecting in mirrors, these vampires are only active on the nights of the full moon. In other words, just like Paul Naschy’s werewolf character Waldemar Daninsky, they are perfectly normal people most of the time. Needless to say this makes their identification more difficult than usual. It also means that by the time the investigators have unmasked the vampires they tend to be romantically or otherwise involved.
In addition these vampires origins are somehow connected to the Knights Templar, thus alluding to De Ossorio’s Blind Dead films.
Pushing things a bit further, there is also a cursed lake/swamp vaguely reminiscent of the one housing the titular in another De Ossorio film, The Lorelei’s Grasp – itself another Spanish made, but German-set, production.
Music is used prominently throughout, but without any obvious coherence to the set of cues deployed – a Gothic cue being followed by a riff on Peter Gunn, for instance. Likely it was not just that that the cues came from the CAM library and (four) different (Italian) composers, since much the same could be said about many Spanish horror films of the period. Rather, it sounds like they came from a wide range of library albums.
The filmmakers make good use of locations, most notably and old castle. There are also some effective atmospherics, including the usual long passages of characters wandering along long passages and down into the castle dungeons, along with some suitably dream-like uses of slow-motion and day-for-night, especially in the flashbacks. The music in such scenes also tends to be more appropriate.
While not the best film for those with a preference for violent or gory horror this should appeal to those with a preference for sexy horror or the fantastique. Almost the entire female cast appear in skimpy outfits during the day and diaphanous nightwear at other times, and are not adverse to baring their breasts or, in some cases, displaying full-frontal nudity. There are also plenty of hints of lesbianism, extending into some softcore girl-girl frottage, plus some S&M play in the castle’s torture chamber.
The ending also provides a nice frisson...
While the setting is not identified the names of the characters – others include Carl (not Carlos), Greta, Max and Otto – suggest a Germanic rather than Spanish setting. So does another character, Margaret, reportedly fleeing to Switzerland.
Situating horror films outside Spain was, of course, a common feature of late Franco-era productions. It enabled filmmakers to get away with more by providing the excuse that these images were not meant to represent Spain.
The distinctively Spanish nature of the film is, however, conveyed by aspects of the vampire myth as presented here.
Besides the usual tropes around crosses, stakes, and not reflecting in mirrors, these vampires are only active on the nights of the full moon. In other words, just like Paul Naschy’s werewolf character Waldemar Daninsky, they are perfectly normal people most of the time. Needless to say this makes their identification more difficult than usual. It also means that by the time the investigators have unmasked the vampires they tend to be romantically or otherwise involved.
In addition these vampires origins are somehow connected to the Knights Templar, thus alluding to De Ossorio’s Blind Dead films.
Pushing things a bit further, there is also a cursed lake/swamp vaguely reminiscent of the one housing the titular in another De Ossorio film, The Lorelei’s Grasp – itself another Spanish made, but German-set, production.
Music is used prominently throughout, but without any obvious coherence to the set of cues deployed – a Gothic cue being followed by a riff on Peter Gunn, for instance. Likely it was not just that that the cues came from the CAM library and (four) different (Italian) composers, since much the same could be said about many Spanish horror films of the period. Rather, it sounds like they came from a wide range of library albums.
The filmmakers make good use of locations, most notably and old castle. There are also some effective atmospherics, including the usual long passages of characters wandering along long passages and down into the castle dungeons, along with some suitably dream-like uses of slow-motion and day-for-night, especially in the flashbacks. The music in such scenes also tends to be more appropriate.
While not the best film for those with a preference for violent or gory horror this should appeal to those with a preference for sexy horror or the fantastique. Almost the entire female cast appear in skimpy outfits during the day and diaphanous nightwear at other times, and are not adverse to baring their breasts or, in some cases, displaying full-frontal nudity. There are also plenty of hints of lesbianism, extending into some softcore girl-girl frottage, plus some S&M play in the castle’s torture chamber.
The ending also provides a nice frisson...
Thursday, 3 January 2013
Too Much Horror Business
As a book by a celebrity Too Much Horror Business (the title coming from a Misfits song) could easily be labelled as a cash-in based on the author’s fame. Crucially, however, Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett knows his stuff and demonstrates a near lifelong interest in horror film and its assorted memorabilia.
That his interest is genuine was already confirmed, for me, by a 1987 Metallica fan magazine, which included a shot of Hammett and some of his collection as it was then.
The main difference between Hammett and you or I is, of course, one of money: via multi-million sales of Metallica albums, tickets, and merchandise Hammett has enjoyed a quarter century or so being able to afford those rarities that we cannot. He is also able to employ a fellow collector to seek stuff out.
Yet just because Hammett has more money than you or I does not mean that he comes across as in any way superior: his genuine enthusiasm is such that you could imagine giving him a call, turning up on his doorstep 30 minutes later, then shooting the shit about Nosferatu, The Bride of Frankenstein, Black Sunday, and so on for hours, as friends, on an equal footing.
Hammett’s collection is presented by time period and/or media type. There’s a heavy bias towards the classic Universal horrors of the 1930s over more recent films, with little material from the 1980s and almost nothing from the 1990s or later.
Whatever one thinks of Hammett as a guitarist or member of Metallica, the book is well worth getting for the reproductions of posters and other materials.
That his interest is genuine was already confirmed, for me, by a 1987 Metallica fan magazine, which included a shot of Hammett and some of his collection as it was then.
The main difference between Hammett and you or I is, of course, one of money: via multi-million sales of Metallica albums, tickets, and merchandise Hammett has enjoyed a quarter century or so being able to afford those rarities that we cannot. He is also able to employ a fellow collector to seek stuff out.
Yet just because Hammett has more money than you or I does not mean that he comes across as in any way superior: his genuine enthusiasm is such that you could imagine giving him a call, turning up on his doorstep 30 minutes later, then shooting the shit about Nosferatu, The Bride of Frankenstein, Black Sunday, and so on for hours, as friends, on an equal footing.
Hammett’s collection is presented by time period and/or media type. There’s a heavy bias towards the classic Universal horrors of the 1930s over more recent films, with little material from the 1980s and almost nothing from the 1990s or later.
Whatever one thinks of Hammett as a guitarist or member of Metallica, the book is well worth getting for the reproductions of posters and other materials.
Friday, 14 December 2012
Mondo Sexy and Eroticissimo - Bizarre Cinema Archives
For fans of obscure European cinema and associated culture, the Bizarre Cinema archives series by Glittering Images are pretty much indispensible in my opinion, particularly for the English-language reader.
This is because they’re a source of material that is difficult if not impossible to find elsewhere, be it advertising materials, fotoromanzi and cinemaromanzi, images of obscure soundtrack releases and, above all, translated interview and review fragments.
Their bibliographies are also invariably excellent, albeit generally limited in their usefulness if one is not a reader of English, Italian and French, with access to archival sources of a copyright library level. (One of the good things about where I live, Edinburgh, is that it has one of the UK’s copyright libraries, the National Library of Scotland, and so has a copy of just about everything besides so-called ‘grey literature’. Being able to go there and consult issues of Continental Film Review or Cinema X in a separate reading room is a particularly fond memory; it’s also funny to think of their having complete runs of many UK pornographic magazines, likely including those that are now unacceptable due to having 16- or 17-year-old nude models.)
These two recent Glittering Images volumes, published in 2011 and 2012 respectively and curated by mainstay Stefano Piselli are no different. Mondo Sexy deals with the mondo film in its various incarnations, while Eroticissimo presents sequences from a number of cinemaromanzi (i.e. photo-stories) of European sexploitation films made between 1969 and 1973.
As its title suggests, Mondo Sexy takes a somewhat different approach to the mondo filone than the likes of David Kerekes and David Slaters’s Killing for Culture (a substantially revised third edition of which is due for publication in the new year) and Mark Goodall’s Sweet and Savage.
Whereas those volumes, especially the former, emphasise the death and shockumentary side of the mondo film, as epitomised by the likes of Africa Addio and The Wild Eye, Mondo Sexy focuses more upon the earlier erotic and exotic side of the genre, beginning in the late 1950s and ending in the mid-1960s.
The filmography of Italian sexy mondos is presented chronologically, making it easier to chart the course of the filone over this period. This said, to fully do so the reader will also need to cross-reference with the second and possibly third filmographies. The former of these is of other Italian mondo and mondo-related films, such as Mondo Cane and Cannibal Holocaust respectively. The latter is of non-Italian productions. Some of these, such as Primitive London, are basically sexy mondos in their subject matter and approach, while others, such as Exhibition, illustrate the shift to hardcore that had come to dominate the sex(y) film by the 1970s.
For the general reader -- to the extent that there is such a thing as a general audience for specialist publications like these -- Eroticissimo is perhaps the better option if finances are limited; as followers of Glittering Images will know their books are neither particularly easy to get hold of (I got these from an Italian-based seller on Ebay, and have got some previous volumes from Italian online retailer Bloodbuster), nor particularly cheap.
This is principally because rather than featuring mostly now-forgotten erotic and exotic performers from circa 1959-65, as its counterpart does, Eroticissimo instead features many of the best known and most beautiful starlets of Italian and European cult cinema of a decade or so later, including Rosalba Neri, Edwige Fenech, Janine Reynaud and Sandra Julien.
The films the images of these women and the stories they are part of also showcase the work of some of European trash cinema’s more interesting auteurs, including Jose Larraz (with Whirlpool), Jose Benazeraf (Frustration) and Renato Polselli (Mania).
There are, however, two main criticisms I have of the book. First, Pilselli does not particularly contextualise the fotoromanzi extracts shown. This makes it difficult to know how representative they are. Did the typical fotoromanzi tell the same story as the film it was based upon, or merely offer edited (sexy) highlights in a manner akin to an 8mm version of a feature? Second -- and perhaps more in the way of wishful thinking -- might it be possible for Glittering Images to republish a fotoromanzi or two in their complete form, such that we might then be better able to understand its particular aesthetics in relation to the film and the comic book?
This is because they’re a source of material that is difficult if not impossible to find elsewhere, be it advertising materials, fotoromanzi and cinemaromanzi, images of obscure soundtrack releases and, above all, translated interview and review fragments.
Their bibliographies are also invariably excellent, albeit generally limited in their usefulness if one is not a reader of English, Italian and French, with access to archival sources of a copyright library level. (One of the good things about where I live, Edinburgh, is that it has one of the UK’s copyright libraries, the National Library of Scotland, and so has a copy of just about everything besides so-called ‘grey literature’. Being able to go there and consult issues of Continental Film Review or Cinema X in a separate reading room is a particularly fond memory; it’s also funny to think of their having complete runs of many UK pornographic magazines, likely including those that are now unacceptable due to having 16- or 17-year-old nude models.)
These two recent Glittering Images volumes, published in 2011 and 2012 respectively and curated by mainstay Stefano Piselli are no different. Mondo Sexy deals with the mondo film in its various incarnations, while Eroticissimo presents sequences from a number of cinemaromanzi (i.e. photo-stories) of European sexploitation films made between 1969 and 1973.
As its title suggests, Mondo Sexy takes a somewhat different approach to the mondo filone than the likes of David Kerekes and David Slaters’s Killing for Culture (a substantially revised third edition of which is due for publication in the new year) and Mark Goodall’s Sweet and Savage.
Whereas those volumes, especially the former, emphasise the death and shockumentary side of the mondo film, as epitomised by the likes of Africa Addio and The Wild Eye, Mondo Sexy focuses more upon the earlier erotic and exotic side of the genre, beginning in the late 1950s and ending in the mid-1960s.
The filmography of Italian sexy mondos is presented chronologically, making it easier to chart the course of the filone over this period. This said, to fully do so the reader will also need to cross-reference with the second and possibly third filmographies. The former of these is of other Italian mondo and mondo-related films, such as Mondo Cane and Cannibal Holocaust respectively. The latter is of non-Italian productions. Some of these, such as Primitive London, are basically sexy mondos in their subject matter and approach, while others, such as Exhibition, illustrate the shift to hardcore that had come to dominate the sex(y) film by the 1970s.
For the general reader -- to the extent that there is such a thing as a general audience for specialist publications like these -- Eroticissimo is perhaps the better option if finances are limited; as followers of Glittering Images will know their books are neither particularly easy to get hold of (I got these from an Italian-based seller on Ebay, and have got some previous volumes from Italian online retailer Bloodbuster), nor particularly cheap.
This is principally because rather than featuring mostly now-forgotten erotic and exotic performers from circa 1959-65, as its counterpart does, Eroticissimo instead features many of the best known and most beautiful starlets of Italian and European cult cinema of a decade or so later, including Rosalba Neri, Edwige Fenech, Janine Reynaud and Sandra Julien.
The films the images of these women and the stories they are part of also showcase the work of some of European trash cinema’s more interesting auteurs, including Jose Larraz (with Whirlpool), Jose Benazeraf (Frustration) and Renato Polselli (Mania).
There are, however, two main criticisms I have of the book. First, Pilselli does not particularly contextualise the fotoromanzi extracts shown. This makes it difficult to know how representative they are. Did the typical fotoromanzi tell the same story as the film it was based upon, or merely offer edited (sexy) highlights in a manner akin to an 8mm version of a feature? Second -- and perhaps more in the way of wishful thinking -- might it be possible for Glittering Images to republish a fotoromanzi or two in their complete form, such that we might then be better able to understand its particular aesthetics in relation to the film and the comic book?
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